A Dendrochemical Survey of Sugar Maple (Acer saccharum Marsh) in South-Central Ontario,Canada

A dendrochemical survey of sugar maple (Acer saccharum Marsh) was conducted insouth-central Ontario, which encompassed twenty-two sites in areas that both exceeded orwere below the published Critical Loads with respect to acid deposition. Areas thatexceeded the Critical Load were located remote from point emission sources, but were alsocharacterized by thin, nutrient-poor soils overlying the Precambrian Shield. ThepH_aq of surface soils (A-horizon) was lower at sites on the Precambrian Shield andwater-extractable concentrations of Ca decreased exponentially with decreasing soil pH. Significant polynomial relationships between soil pH and soil Ca and sugar maple growth,assessed as cumulative tree-ring growth between 1949 and 1998, explained 40% and 37% ofthe variation in sugar maple growth respectively, with lowest growth associated with lowsoil pH and low soil Ca. Furthermore, there was a significant linearrelationship between wood Ca concentrations (averaged between 1949 and 1998) and soil pHand concentrations of several trace elements in wood (Mn, Pb, Zn, Cd, Sr and Rb) were greater atlow soil pH. Poor sugar maple growth was associated with low wood Ca concentrations andhigh wood Al levels, which together accounted for 43% of the variation in sugar maplegrowth in a multiple regression model. None of the other wood chemistry variablescontributed significantly to the model. These data suggest that sugar maple grows poorlyon acidic soils with low Ca and high Al levels. Although such acidic podzols occurnaturally in some areas overlying the Precambrian Shield, if Ca losses due to aciddeposition and/or harvesting exceed inputs through weathering and deposition(i.e. exceed Critical Load), sugar maple growth may be adversely affected and ultimately lead toincreased incidence of sugar maple decline.